The Darjeeling Limited Review

Anderson's latest chronicles his efforts to come to terms with his own artistic evolution.

When I was in college, I dated a girl named Angela. She was beautiful and she was my first everything, but after a long summer apart in our respective hometowns we both realized that our relationship was not destined to last. Angela eventually beat me to the punch when time came to break up, but this juxtaposition between youthful idealism and reluctant maturity is essentially what Wes Anderson's movies feel like: a romantic meditation on the sad but inevitably necessary coming-of-age experiences that provide us with a sense of perspective and comfort later in life.

Suffice it to say that other works like Salinger's Catcher in the Rye and Vince Guaraldi's immortal Charlie Brown theme "Christmas Time is Here" -- the latter of which is actually used in The Royal Tenenbaums -- also capture the autumnal feeling that Anderson weaves into his stories. But each project in the director's repertoire reflects not only an evolving mastery of this theme, but an important and acknowledged self-awareness that he must move on from it in order to mature as a filmmaker -- all of which he does to powerful effect in his latest effort, The Darjeeling Limited.

In the film, Owen Wilson stars as Francis Whitman, the oldest of three brothers whom he has reunited under false pretenses. Recovering from undisclosed injuries he claims gave him a newfound lease on life, Francis hatches a plan to reconnect with his younger siblings in India, coordinated down to the last detail. His brothers unfortunately each have their own problems to solve -- Peter (Adrien Brody) is about to become a father, while Jack (Jason Schwartzman) is despondent over an ex-girlfriend -- and are initially reluctant to open up to the prospect of some spiritual or emotional epiphany. But when they discover that their estranged mother Patricia (Angelica Huston) is also in India working at a convent taking care of orphans, Francis, Peter and Jack reluctantly join together to visit her and hopefully recover what few shreds remain of their familial solidarity.

While a lot of filmmakers -- even those who write their own material -- will agree to make a movie based upon the strength of or opportunity provided by just one great scene, folks like Anderson want every scene to be a great, magical moment -- some perfect combination of music, imagery, and acting that encapsulates a certain feeling or state of being. This, unfortunately, can sometimes be a trap, as evidenced by Cameron Crowe's ambitious but uneven Elizabethtown where too many scenes were meticulously crafted to be poignant or poetic, while few others served the characters and story in a direct, unpretentious way.

In Darjeeling, Anderson makes this a central theme for his characters -- an obstacle, even -- and one which they return to time and again until they learn to appreciate the simple pleasures of letting life happen. Jack, for example, not only pines for a perfect romantic rendezvous with his ex-girlfriend, but he has an iPod ready and waiting with the "perfect song" for the moment when he can create that with some- or anyone else, including a comely train stewardess named Rita (Amara Karan). Meanwhile, Francis' grand scheme is to schedule, plan, and coordinate their journey of rediscovery and redemption, all but obliterating the natural opportunity for personal revelations amidst a minutely-designed schedule of tourist-friendly detours, half-hearted rituals and photo opportunities.

Anderson's last film, The Life Aquatic, received deservedly mixed reviews -- it had many, many great qualities along with its shortcomings -- but almost all of them observed that he was sort of teetering on a precipice, in danger of falling too deeply in love with his font sizes, color schemes and quirky characterizations. Darjeeling is a response to that: Not only an acknowledgement of the dangers of indulging his most idiosyncratic impulses, he rightly points out that even in a carefully-constructed environment things have a way of falling messily out of order, and often to even more profound effect.

As supposedly organized as is the Whitman brothers' journey, their best-laid plans are soon about as useful as a laminating machine in the middle of India -- which, coincidentally, they actually have -- and they ultimately find that no amount of preparation will rescue them from what they're actually running from... namely, their collective past. Further, Anderson sets up the dynamics of the story and the characters' relationships very early on, essentially copping to the fact that he's filtering an otherwise conventional coming-of-age story through his own unique sensibility. (The fact that he cowrote the film with Schwartzman and Roman Coppola also speaks to this departure from his usually more subtle approach. But, as always, no matter who his collaborators are, the end result is ultimately Anderson's show.)

Overall, the director's latest is not a film that will necessarily secure him scores of new fans, but it should rally and regroup his existing ones thanks to a well-told, emotionally-engaging story and familiar -- if different-by-degrees -- approach to the filmmaking process. The Life Aquatic proved like Elizabethtown or even The Hudsucker Proxy before it that some directors function better on a smaller scale, if only because all that character detail and quirk generally is too specific to register with a large number of people. In other words, sometimes it takes a few tries to find the right fit for a lasting relationship, even one between an artist and his or her audience.

The Darjeeling Limited, by comparison, feels like a more comfortable fit than its predecessor -- a newcomer that possesses almost all of the qualities of former companions, but offers the promise of new and even more interesting opportunities in the future. As far as coming-of-age experiences go, this is undoubtedly my favorite thus far of 2007 -- cinematic or otherwise. But the best part about it is the fact that unlike so many others it will sustain my interest again and again, and never with sadness or reluctance. Even if Angela and I were never right for each other except during that particular time under those particular circumstances, I take no small comfort in the fact that films like this one will endure now and for years to come as a reason to remain youthful and idealistic -- no matter how old or reluctantly mature I may get.